


Guess How Much I Love You

by orangeCrates



Series: Hearts Exchanged [2]
Category: Assassin's Creed
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Family Fluff, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-08-25
Updated: 2014-08-25
Packaged: 2018-02-14 16:15:16
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,092
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2198421
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orangeCrates/pseuds/orangeCrates
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Falling in love is only part it, Malik knew. When you were a father, it meant nothing if they love you but cannot love your child. He's relieved then, that Altair does both.</p><p>Now it's just a matter of figuring out how to share.</p><p>Set sometime during "Your Heart and Mine"</p>
            </blockquote>





	Guess How Much I Love You

**Author's Note:**

  * For [King of Novices (mykonos)](https://archiveofourown.org/users/mykonos/gifts).



There hadn’t been other romantic interests in Malik’s life between the time after Tazim was born and before Altair came into it.  
  
That’s not to say no one had been interested, but as a single father raising a newborn, there wasn’t any time to give them the time of day. There had been one encounter that stuck with him though, involving someone who had the gall to suggest to Malik a babysitter he could call up so they could go out for drinks that night.  
  
She’s really good with children, he said.  
  
I’m sure she’d love to meet your son, he added.  
  
Malik had never turned down someone more quickly.  
  
It wasn’t anything new, sadly. When he’d been raising Kadar, there had been plenty of people who would gush about how cute his brother was then quietly resent Kadar because of how much of Malik’s time he took up. Those break ups tended to involve a lot of noise, always on their part (except for that first time, when he’d been caught by surprised and hurt because he thought she _understood_. Inevitably, it always came back to this one question: him or me?  
  
And for all the confusion in his life, the answer to that question has always been simple.  
  
Eventually he came to the realization that he could not love someone who’d make him choose, as if his loving either Tazim or Kadar diminishes his love for them. Only two people people seem to have truly grasped this. One of them was gone and the other was currently reading a storybook with his five (soon to be six. The distinction is important whenever Tazim wanted something that they told him he was too young for) year old curled up at his side. From the way Tazim’s head kept drooping only to snap up again when he caught himself before repeating the motions all over again, he was pretty close to falling asleep. Altair pauses midpage.  
  
"Should we stop here?"  
  
To which the answer is an immediate and emphatic (if sleepy) ‘no’. And Malik’s heart swells when Altair only chuckled and leaned down to place a kiss on top of Tazim’s head before continuing to read.  
  
Tazim isn’t yet old enough to not want to be sung to sleep by his father, but Altair had quickly outstripped Malik in being the preferred storybook reader. The first time they’d read together, it had been when Malik hadn’t been present. So imagine his surprise when he began to read and Tazim asked him to do the voices.  
  
"Altair does them."  
  
He had arched a brow and looked at his boyfriend of (then) five months who had gone from smiling to looking distinctly embarrassed. Maybe he should have been more bothered that a place he held in Tazim’s life has been usurped, but even he had to admit that Altair seemed to possess an enthusiasm for children books that Malik didn’t. (That, and he did a passable job at pitching his voice at a falsetto when he was saying the princess’s lines.)  
  
The most important reason though, was that Malik understood he wasn’t being replaced. It is simply that he now must share Tazim’s affections with Altair, the same way that Tazim has come to realize he now must share his father’s (that hadn’t been a conversation Malik had relished, but it helped that the boy was as fond of Altair as the man was of him). It would be petty to be jealous of something like that, and it would make him no better than those people who always asked, ‘him or me?’. So he let it go and, instead, enjoyed the picture the two of them made, snuggled together with a book between them.  
  
When Tazim had fallen asleep on him that first time, Altair had sat there unsure of what to do until Malik huffed a short laugh and helped by maneuvering Tazim so he was lying down instead of on Altair’s arm, knowing from years of practice how to do it without waking the child.  
  
Now, when Tazim falls asleep, Altair closes the book and does the same, tucking Tazim in. Altair brushes a hand through Tazim’s hair before standing to replace the book on the shelf where it belonged.  
  
Malik, who is leaning against the door frame with his arms cross in front of his chest, smiled faintly, “How many times have you read that one?”  
  
Altair chuckles, “I’ve lost count.” They both go into the hall and Altair looks back once more before closing the door.  
  
Then he turns around and crowds into Malik’s space, backing him against the wall with a smirk and hands on Malik’s hips. Malik snorts at his impatience but is the first to lean in to slot their mouths together. It’s not always easy to find time to be alone with a child so sometimes they just have to take what they could get. (And really, Malik knows neither of them would have it any other way.)  
  
"It’s getting late." Malik says when they break apart and Altair’s smile turns a bit rueful.  
  
"I’ll see you tomorrow then." He says, taking it as the dismissal it was not and starts to take a step back only for Malik to not let go.  
  
There are a lot of things Malik loved about Altair, up to and including the fact that he understood that Malik could not stay the night at his place, that sometimes spending time together means Tazim would be there too, that he would read to Tazim with the same sort of enthusiasm he did the very first time. And, though Malik would not admit it, the fact that he was kind of an idiot was sometimes (only sometimes) a little endearing.  
  
One of Malik’s hands trail from Altair’s nape to bury his fingers in his short hair. He pulls Altair close so their foreheads touched, “Or you could stay the night.” And he watches Altair process that before he grins and settles his hands on Malik’s hips again.  
  
"Yeah?"  
  
Malik is tempted for a moment, to say ‘no’ just to see what he would do. But Altair’s hand slip back to his ass and he decides there are better things to do and pulls the idiot in for another kiss.  
  
~ + ~  
  
Tazim’s eyes are wide as saucers when he sees Altair sitting at the table when he comes down for breakfast and Malik reminds him that he must finish his breakfast and let Altair finish his before he can pester him to play.

**Author's Note:**

> Anyone who can guess what book Altair was reading towards the end (so not the one involving a princess) gets a cookie. Or, on a related note, anyone who could guess why I named this story with the title I did also gets a cookie.


End file.
